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5 shot at suburban Detroit roller rink

Three gunmen stormed into a crowded suburban Detroit roller rink and opened fire, shooting five people, at the tail-end of a pre-Christmas skating party early Friday.

AP Wire

Dec 24, 2011

The victims — three women and two men — were taken to hospitals after the violence at the Rolladium Skating Center in Oakland County's Waterford Township just before 2 a.m., although none suffered life-threatening injuries, co-owner Kurt Anselmi said.

“Our videos show three young men wearing baggy clothes enter through the exit doors as people were leaving,” Anselmi told The Detroit News. “They then go about 30 feet into the building towards the rink area and start firing. It appeared all three of them fired guns. Then they ran out, one of them holding his gun behind him still firing it in the opposite direction as he ran out of the building.”

The victims all are in their early 20s. Four received grazing wounds to their hands or legs. The fifth was shot in his upper body.

Two of the women and the two men are from Pontiac, while the third woman lives in nearby White Lake Township.

One of two earlier altercations between partygoers may have prompted the violence, Waterford Township Police Chief Dan McCaw said.

“There was a fight between people at the event, and three men left and returned with guns and started shooting and then left,” McCaw said.

About 290 people were inside the rink, about 25 miles northwest of Detroit, when the shooting occurred. Promoters of the party provided security for the event.

“What’s so sad is a few people can ruin an evening of entertainment for young people and turn fun into tragedy. Nobody’s immune to these random acts of violence,” Anselmi said.

No one has been arrested. Police were interviewing witnesses and reviewing surveillance video.

Suburban roller rinks have — for the most part — escaped the fights and violence that have in the past plagued rinks inside the city of Detroit.

“We’ve never had any problem like that ... it’s been a good event,” McCaw told The Oakland Press of Pontiac about previous holiday parties at the rink.